Midland City Standoff

5:16 pm

Mon February 4, 2013

The Week-long Midland City Hostage Situation Has Ended

Reporters await the announcement that the Midland City hostage situation has ended.

Credit Dothan Eagle

The week-long hostage ordeal of a 5-year-old Alabama boy is over. Officials say the man who killed a bus driver and took the boy from a school bus last Tuesday is dead. The drama played out in an underground bunker where retired truck driver Jim Dykes had held the boy.

Authorities say a decision was made to storm the bunker because the child was in imminent danger.

Steve Richardson with the FBI's office in Mobile said at a news conference Monday afternoon that negotiations deteriorated and that 65-year-old Jimmy Lee Dykes had been seen with a gun.

At that, officers believed the child was in imminent danger. Officers entered the bunker just after 3 p.m. CST.